There are many meatball recipes and this is the
recipe that I use and is the one that will remind you of home cooking in a big
Italian-American family. Most
nineteenth- and early twentieth century Italian-American immigrants came from
southern Italy, with Naples and Sicily
being well represented. In the old
country they were called polpette and
they were a way for these large and often poor families to stretch a lira and
use all that leftover stale bread. There
are some secrets to a good meatball.
Here they are: first, use ground chuck mixed with ground pork in a three
to one or two to one ratio. Soak Italian
bread in milk and squeeze it out and add to the meat so that it represents
about twenty-five percent of the weight of the meatballs. Bake or fry them before adding to a tomato ragł so they emit as much fat as
possible. I usually make a lot of
meatballs at once because they freeze so well and have many purposes from spaghetti
and meatballs to meatball heros.

[photo: Clifford A. Wright]

Yield: Makes 70 meatballs
Preparation Time: 1 hour

2 quarts cubed
Italian bread with crust (1 ¼ pounds)

2 cups milk

3 pounds ground beef
chuck

1 pound ground pork

3 large eggs

1 medium onion,
finely chopped

½ bunch flat-leaf
parsley, leaves only, finely chopped

1 tablespoon salt

Freshly ground black
pepper to taste

1. Place the bread
in a bowl and pour the milk over them.
Let soak until the crust is soft, about 20 minutes. Squeeze the milk out and put the bread into a
bowl. Add the beef, pork, eggs, onion,
parsley, salt, and pepper and mix well with your hands.

2. Preheat the oven
to 300 degrees F.

3. Place the meat in
a food processor and process in batches until pasty and smooth, about 15
seconds per batch. Pour some water into
a bowl and leave near to where you will make the meatballs so you can dip your
hands to keep the meat from sticking to them.
Remove the meat to a bowl and form into balls the size of a golf ball
using wet hands and place on an ungreased 11 x 14-inch baking tray.

4. Bake, without
turning, until the meatballs are brown, about 40 minutes. Remove and use for spaghetti and meatballs or
freeze for later use.

Note: Although the
meat is cooked at the end of step 3, you can cook it for up 1 ½ hours longer if
using in a ragł.

Variation:

Note:

Although the meat is
cooked at the end of step 4, you can cook it for up 1 ½ hours longer if using
in a ragł.

If there is a cookbook of the year, this [Mediterranean Feast] is it. A remarkably ambitious work....The subject is vast, the scope of time daunting, but Wright comes across as a cheerful, dedicated scholar who was sorry when he had to stop. Recipes are written to be accessible to contemporary cooks. - William Rice, Chicago Tribune

Clifford Wright has put together 300 mouthwatering recipes [in Real Stew] that I want to try in the next week! This is exactly what I feel like eating right now. - David Rosengarten, host of TV Food Networks In Food Today and author of Taste: One Palates Journey Through the Wo